That’s garlic mustard. And my hand, pulling it up.

Garlic Mustard is a culinary herb that was brought here to eat by some settlers a while back. Unfortunately, it doesn’t just taste good, it spreads very quickly and chokes out all of the indigenous undergrowth. So some towns, like mine, have organized garlic mustard eradication efforts. There are organized “pulls,” information sessions, folks at the waste station handing our recipes and bags and instruction. You can even call a hotline and have somebody pick up your garlic mustard bag from your house.

Last year I pulled some and brought it in to taste. We made a garlic mustard pesto and it was tasty. This year we decided to go a bit further. I brought almost 100 lbs to the kitchen. Look for it in the our garlic mustard pesto salad. It’s been a big hit. We have a ways to go, but if we’re successful with this one we’ll have less and less garlic mustard each year.